Cine 10
1440 Central Avenue,
Colonie,
NY
12205
1440 Central Avenue,
Colonie,
NY
12205
3 people
favorited this theater
Additional Info
Previously operated by: Hoyts Cinemas, Regal Cinemas
Previous Names: Cine 1-2-3-4, Cine 1-2-3-4-5-6, Cine 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8
Nearby Theaters
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Regal Colonie Center Stadiu...
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Fox Colonie 1 & 2
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Regal Crossgates Stadium 18...
News About This Theater
- May 23, 2012 — Celebrating the Original STAR WARS on its 35th Anniversary
This started life as the ultra-modern Cine 1-2-3-4 opening on June 30, 1972. The theatre was located behind the Northway Mall in Colonie and was the Albany area’s top-grossing theatre for a good number of years. It was built by SBC Theatres, and was similar in style and architecture to their Cinema City in Hartford, CT (now Bow Tie Cinema City), the Cine 8 in Enfield, CT (demolished), and the Cine Greece in Greece, NY. Originally, theatres 1 and 2 seated roughly 400 each, and 3 and 4 seated roughly 250 each. The houses all featured red rocker-recliner chairs, red wall drapes, and floating curved screens with no masking. In the mid-1970’s, two more screens were added, along with two more illuminated blue numbers onto the existing sign, reading “CINE 1-2-3-4-5-6”. The two new screens sat roughly 200 each.
A few years later, two more screens were added next to 5 and 6, seating roughly 200 each. Two more numbers went onto the façade, reading “CINE 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8”. SBC sold their chain to Hoyt’s around 1990, and sometime either just before or after, theatres 1 and 2 were split, and the numbers 2 through 8 were pulled off the façade, replaced with a single “0”, thus the sign read “CINE 10”.
Major competition came in 1984 in the newly-built Crossgates Mall 12, opened by Cinema Centers Corporation. The new mall is located under two miles away from the Northway Mall, which by this time could have been classified as a ‘dead mall’. Hoyt’s also bought Cinema Centers around the same time they purchased SBC, so they owned both theatres. In the late 90’s, the Crossgates Mall underwent a massive expansion, and Hoyt’s opened a new stadium-seated 18-plex in another part of the mall, giving them 30 screens in two complexes at Crossgates. At this time, the Cine 10 became “ALL SEATS $2.99” and showed sub-run movies. The attendance rebounded, but once the lease ran up, Hoyt’s closed up shop at the Cine 10, in the year 2000.
The theatre sat, gutted, vacant, and somewhat boarded up, for years. It was demolished in May, 2007, along with a former adjacent department store building, for a Lowe’s Home Center.
Contributed by
Joe Masher
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Recent comments (view all 8 comments)
Had a rather pungent aroma in its last year or two…
Yes, it was quite musty-smelling in the end. The last thing I saw there was the South Park movie. By that time the theater had been reduced to a discount operation, as the tickets were only $3.
When originally built, there were some other, smaller theaters nearby — the one at Colonie Center (two screens in a separate building, now gone), and the Fox Colonie. Together, these drew in moviegoers from all over the Capital District. Unfortunately, I don’t think the owners ever put a dime into upkeep, even when they kept splitting it up — the place was ratty fairly early on.
I managed this theater (and became a district manager under Hoyts) from 1980 thru 1987. I take issue with the reinvestment note on the previous post, as SBC constantly improved this under-built, over sold house. I supervised construction of all expansions (6-8, 8-10) and the interior box office addition and expansion. We had a game room in the early 80’s and were one of the first computerized box-offices in the east.
We also brought in dolby stereo, surround sound and handicapped seating, before it was mandated.
Now granted, this was a ‘modern’ cinder block theatre, but it was one of the best grossing theatres in the northeast. We often conjectured that we could have shown home movies on the Cine screens and generated grosses.
Nick
Photo’s of the abandonded theatre here:
http://www.cinematour.com/tour/us/7133.html
This place wasn’t great but I have two strong memories from attending films here as a teenager. One was seeing “Casino” with my Father and the theater actually booked an intermission (as in they deliberately cut the film at roughly the 90 min mark, raised the lights, and had an attendant come in and yell “intermission”) so my Father and I just went outside and stood in the sun for 10 minutes. The other memory was skateboarding in the parking lot with my friends and being chased off by security, which meant we missed our showtime. Don’t think we actually saw a movie that day.
I remember coming here back in 70'with my dad to see Star Wars.Also seeing Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi.The place don’t look the same to me.
Opened June 30th, 1972. Grand opening ad posted.